


On Leaving and Being Left

by TheSoulOfAStrawberry



Category: Trollhunters (Cartoon)
Genre: Backstory, Character Study, Depression, Discussion of Abortion, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Family, Family Bonding, Gen, Mother-Son Relationship, Motherhood, Past Relationship(s), Postnatal depression
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-04
Updated: 2018-03-03
Packaged: 2019-03-26 17:51:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13862820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSoulOfAStrawberry/pseuds/TheSoulOfAStrawberry
Summary: Barbara Lake can't believe she nearly left her son.(An extensive backstory of Barbara Lake)





	On Leaving and Being Left

Jim wasn’t born in California.

She wished he had been. She wished she’d never left California in the first place.

But she had left, pregnant, drunk on love and wholly intoxicated by James’ wry smile, and the stories he told about the life they’d make themselves in New Jersey and how much better it’d be than small-town California, because wasn’t anywhere better than Nowheresville in the desert, right? They’d see the sea, walk along the boardwalks, day-trip to New York City and hear the spirit of the Statue of Liberty whispering on the Atlantic breeze.

But it wasn’t. 

For one, they were nowhere near the sea, and far closer to Philadelphia than New York. Their cramped terrace house was draughty and perpetually smelled like rotting leaves, a scent that drove her almost mad, obsessively cleaning all the drains in her first sixth months before she became accustomed to the stench. The house on their left was boarded up, and the house to their right did not take kindly to a young couple with a baby living next door. James was right though: it was theirs, and that was what mattered. They swept the steps and put out hanging baskets, and Barbara tried her best to inhabit the new space, unfamiliar and imperfect and yet _hers_.

And then there was James’ job, the position lecturing at a university he’d talked big about, only when it came down to it the institution was more of a community college than a Princeton. He only had classes three times a week, though admittedly seeming to spend the rest of his waking hours marking or reading up for a lesson. The pay didn’t reflect the time he spent working, but she asked him about it, and he construed it as questioning his competence. She wanted to explain that no, she cared about him and only wanted to see him paid what he was worth, but he wore his lips into a thin line and she decided not to push it. It was not as if there was much she could do about it. Even if she’d ever gotten anything more than a high-school diploma, James insisted she not work.

“Only the best for Mommy,” he’d tell her bump, before sweeping her quite literally off her feet, dipping her so elegantly, as if she wasn’t 5 months pregnant. He’d kiss her, and for a while she’d forget their money troubles, forget that they had no working oven, that they could only use the car for emergencies because they couldn’t afford the gas, that they had no TV and no landline, just the cell James used for work. 

She’d considered an abortion. Not to the extent that she discussed it with James: he’d never had agreed, and she’d have been a monster to ever suggest tearing apart the family he’d worked so hard to achieve, the pregnancy he’d given up his life to support. But that didn’t mean she didn’t think about it. She checked advice websites in a secluded corner of the public library, reading forums and trying to imagine herself as one of those anonymous women, admitting falling pregnant at 20 was a mistake and then committing it in writing for the world to see. She thought and thought, long and hard, lay in bed at night by herself wearing four layers because she didn’t want to waste money on heating when it was only her in the house.

But life went on, quite literally. Barbara tried to keep busy, spending most of her days cleaning, or at the launderette. She took a quiet pride in it, and although she hated seeing herself in a mirror, she enjoyed the old ladies cooing over her behind the dryers, insisting she was having a girl. They could tell by the way her belly-button poked out, they told her. It was ridiculous and sweet and human, all at the same time.

Things only got harder when the baby was born. He (Barbara made sure to flaunt his little blue clothes to the old ladies in the launderette) was, of course, named after his father; there was no question about it. Barbara found it quite fitting, considering the pink-faced creature attached to her breast: James Sturges Jr, another James, as if there was anything more to life. 

This James was far more demanding. He had no high and mighty ideas about duty or breadwinning; he only cried, and cried, and cried, until Barbara wanted to tear her hair out with frustration. Sometimes, when the elder James wasn’t around, she’d let him cry, and lie in the other room, staring blankly at the ceiling and listen, waiting for him to tire himself out. He did, eventually. In fact, he stopped crying almost altogether, but in a way that made it even worse, as now Barbara had no good reason why she resented her own son so very, very much. The house became quiet, and the voices in her head could no longer be drowned out with screams.

The world outside started going at a horrifying pace too. A few months after Junior’s first birthday, just as she was wondering if she could get back onto her feet after all, the world seem to become darker. They still had no TV so she didn’t see the planes hit, but there was an eerie stillness to that September day, and James came home looking ashen. And thus, America went to war with nothing and everything, and Barbara stayed at home more often. One of their hanging baskets was knocked down, but the plants were long dead. Barbara didn’t fix it.

When Junior turned three and they began to consider schooling, Barbara begged James for them to move again, back to California. He told her she was selfish and naïve, and he was right, but that didn’t stop her wanting her Mom.

And so they returned to California, in the same banged-up Ford Fiesta they’d left in, with almost the same CDs in the stereo (Kelly Clarkson being the new addition).

She’d always wanted to be somebody. That’s why they’d moved in the first place; she didn’t want to be “Barb” anymore, she wanted to road-trip across the country with the love of her life, watch the sunset, and snort when she laughed. She’d failed, she supposed. She’d graduated high school with a 4.0 GPA and a bright future and all she’d come to at 23 was meek stay-at-home Mom to a toddler who was, as the community nurse had put it, a “late talker”. James had had some less delicate ways to describe it. 

Maybe her priorities had shifted though. She didn’t think it had much to do with Junior, but her Mom did, and maybe her Mom understood it all a lot better than her. She didn’t ask questions when they finally arrived on her doorstep in San Bernardino, just helped them with their bags and gave Junior a cup of juice, and James and Barbara cups of ice tea dripping with condensation. 

California was warm. Literally-speaking, of course: the heat rose to almost unbearable temperatures in July and she wondered how anyone had every considered this part of the world habitable, as her skin grew slimy with sweat and the small lawn outside her mother’s house became brown and crisp. But there was another kind of warmth to it, even in winter; the kind that seeped into her bones, into her heart. Her son might tell her, years later, that this had to do with a huge yellow crystal underneath the desert that exuded energy and life, and when its power saved her life, she might be inclined to believe him. However, at the time, she simply marvelled at what a difference a move could make. 

So Junior hadn’t been born in California, she thought. They were there now, with her mother hovering over him, letting him help in the kitchen, so long as he washed his hands before, and in the garden, so long as he washed his hands after. She should be grateful. She had a beautiful child, a loving boyfriend, a doting mother, and they’d returned to California, like she’d wanted.

And yet, those years away had left their mark. Her Mom had grown distant, and Barbara didn’t blame her. They both missed her Dad, but only Barbara had missed his funeral, unable to afford the ticket back to California and, although she was sure he was perfectly capable, unwilling to leave Junior with his dad for so long. And the house in San Bernardino, while in a nice, quiet neighbourhood with good transport links and an increasingly beautiful garden, wasn’t the family home in the close-knit desert town she’d loved so dearly. Her Mom had sold it without telling her, and although she shouldn’t, she resented her for it. As if it wasn’t her who had abandoned it, abandoned them.

The loneliness and struggle of New Jersey weighed her down. 2000 miles didn’t matter when she’d brought all of her problems with her.

“There’s always a second chance,” her Mom had said one day, sitting next to her on the grass where she was watching Junior play with next door’s dog. “In general, I mean, but in this case, it’s not too late for you to go to college. You may as well now, while you’re young. I’ll look after Junior.”

“It’s not your job, Mom.”

“It’s not yours either, but James doesn’t seem to have a problem coming home at all hours of the night.”

He’s working.”

“Until 2am? I know I sleep upstairs but I can still hear the door go. He’s a teacher for Pete’s sake, what’s he going to be doing at that time of night? Stop making excuses for him. I’d be happy to take Junior, he’s a sweet little thing. He’ll be starting pre-k next month anyway. Just… Look into applying for something, whatever it is you want to do. I won’t push you, but I… I want you to know we’re here for you now, even if we haven’t been in the past.”

“No, Mom, that’s…” she couldn’t stop the tears, and her Mom embraced her, smothering her with the scent of washing powder and hairspray. It wasn’t long before Junior joined in too, sad that Barbara was crying, and they had to explain to him that Mommy wasn’t upset, that it was happy-crying.

He Mom had said she wouldn’t push, but she had, and it had been exactly what Barbara needed. Studying for a medical degree at the kitchen table while her boyfriend and son slept in the room next door wasn’t ideal, but she could make it work. She had to. James would never let her live it down if she didn’t, and she’d never let herself live it down either.

She wasn’t sure what to make of it when James announced he’d been given a promotion a few towns over. She wasn’t sure she wanted Junior to leave San Bernardino when he was just settling into kindergarten. She wasn’t sure she wanted to leave San Bernardino either, not when she was getting close with her Mom again, and making progress in the therapy sessions she attended on Wednesday evenings (not that James knew about them, admittedly). But James didn’t pose it as a question, and she had no desire to tear their relationship apart based on a petty dispute. 

It wasn’t as if they could live in her Mom’s spare room forever.

**Author's Note:**

> I don’t think I quite intended this to be as depressing as it is (?); Barbara’s a super interesting character who also reminds me a lot of my own mum. There’s a lot of debate about whether she’s emotionally abusive or whether she’s trying her best with what she has, and I think it’s both, and I wanted to explore that and why her relationship with Jim might have turned out the way it did? No way excusing her actions though, I just think she’s dogpiled a bit as a female character compared to Strickler for example, but hmu with your thoughts if you got any :0
> 
> tbc!!


End file.
